Musing of an Epic Virgin
- Thread starter Jack99
- Start date
Jack99
Adventurer
Well, its really different reasons. First of, these characters were created back when 4e just came out, so people wanted to explore the different possibilities a bit. But also (a big part of it) was bringing the party together and creating some consistency. After a near-wipe around level 2, I brought out the idea of creating a party that had more in common. Or at least some of them.
Carric was going to a cleric of Kord, and so the Fighter decided to multi-class into cleric (of Kord) as well, to bring them closer together (I am guessing that he didn't mind the extra Healing Word). He was also at the time afraid that a fighter might turn out to be a bit too boring in the long run (they had in the previous editions - to him anyway), so he wanted to keep his options open, maybe going for some ritual casting later on. As it turns out, it was never needed.
The wizard made a background about his father working for the Church of Kord, having visions and premonitions that he expressed as paintings (yeah, and he has never seen an episode of Heroes). That way, we had a trio of the party, the core being Kord-centric. Then, as they gained a few levels, I started giving visions to the wizard. From there, it was a no-brainer to pick up a multi-class feat and multi-class him into cleric (of Kord of course) so that he could pick up divine oracle (and later sage of ages) to round of his character.
Why the Cleric chose to multi-class into ranger and the warlock into bard? The cleric did it to get perception trained, and he felt it fit the theme of the campaign (lots of exploring the new world vibe). The warlock did it for some sort of optimization. Not anything broken or even remotely, but in the mind of his player, it gave him some nifty bonuses that he wanted for the character. This doesn't bother me much. I prefer that people have the character that they want, I have found it makes for much better campaigns.
A bit off topic, but how do you determine +33% damage relatively quickly? (or not quickly) Do you make all your monsters ahead of time?
A year of experience with 4E has me leaning towards this for a new Paragon game:
All opponents -2/-3/-4 to all defenses. (by tier)
All opponents +2/+3/+4 damage to all attacks. (by tier)
Minions typically take 2 hits to take out (bloodied on first hit) unless critically hit. Damage
done by a Controller or a Daily Power may also take them out (they must Save).
Elite and Solo monsters can and often will pay 10% of their full hit point value to either recharge encounter powers or to attempt Saves at the beginning of their turns instead of the end.
***
So, I'm upping the damage and lowering the defenses but not lowering the HP (except lowering the defenses has a similar effect while also allowing the players to miss less often) Expertise feats are also banned so the defense lowering is effectively more like -1/-2/-3.
Except in the case of Elites and Solos where I'm intending to effectively lower the hitpoints of those by about 80% most of the time to either guarantee a recharge for an interesting Encounter attack that the dice won't seem to let me recharge or to mitigate some ridiculous stun/daze/prone-lock against a Solo.
With opponents doing higher damage I also expect I might have a foe or two fewer in many combats which is like fewer hitpoints to chew through. And to supplement these smaller numbers with my toughened minions.
I'm using a flat number by tier because that's really easy for me, but I'm curious about your 33%.
A year of experience with 4E has me leaning towards this for a new Paragon game:
All opponents -2/-3/-4 to all defenses. (by tier)
All opponents +2/+3/+4 damage to all attacks. (by tier)
Minions typically take 2 hits to take out (bloodied on first hit) unless critically hit. Damage
done by a Controller or a Daily Power may also take them out (they must Save).
Elite and Solo monsters can and often will pay 10% of their full hit point value to either recharge encounter powers or to attempt Saves at the beginning of their turns instead of the end.
***
So, I'm upping the damage and lowering the defenses but not lowering the HP (except lowering the defenses has a similar effect while also allowing the players to miss less often) Expertise feats are also banned so the defense lowering is effectively more like -1/-2/-3.
Except in the case of Elites and Solos where I'm intending to effectively lower the hitpoints of those by about 80% most of the time to either guarantee a recharge for an interesting Encounter attack that the dice won't seem to let me recharge or to mitigate some ridiculous stun/daze/prone-lock against a Solo.
With opponents doing higher damage I also expect I might have a foe or two fewer in many combats which is like fewer hitpoints to chew through. And to supplement these smaller numbers with my toughened minions.
I'm using a flat number by tier because that's really easy for me, but I'm curious about your 33%.
I just find it really funny that everyone (except the Cleric) Multi-classed into a Leader. So you have four PCs who can throw around an extra heal. I think Jack's games must be rather brutal. 
I also wonder that, if they made their characters now, they might have went with different Divine classes.
But that's rather cool, Jack.
I also wonder that, if they made their characters now, they might have went with different Divine classes.
But that's rather cool, Jack.
Mr. Wilson
Explorer
I just find it really funny that everyone (except the Cleric) Multi-classed into a Leader. So you have four PCs who can throw around an extra heal. I think Jack's games must be rather brutal.
He did houserule a 50% damage increase, so the players probably needed the extra healing (and he did note that resurrections increased as a result).
Jack99
Adventurer
I considered doing the flat number by tier, but the math-part of me got afraid I would screw up the balance - I realize this is totally silly, but I just couldn't get past it. The other reason for not lowering the defenses, was that IME, the rogue hits a lot of monsters on an already ludicrous roll. With lower defenses, he would be hitting on 2's and 3's very often.
I always spend time preparing for an adventure, and that includes some tweaking of monsters. With the Adventure Tools its really quick and takes only 20 seconds to "fix" a monster.
Of course, when my players do something that surprises me and I suddenly need to wing a monster, it takes some calculating. But if you are any good calculating by head, it's really quite easy and quick to divide a number by 3.
Jack99
Adventurer
Well to be fair, the 50% house-rule has been in place since around level 16-17 or so. Before that I experimented with other fixes for another level or two. The players all multi-classed before level 3, and back then, our 4e was 100% by the book (IIRC, we had absolutely no house rules until the paragon tier).
When that is said, my players have been my players for almost 20 years, and they claim I am what would translate best as a Rat Bastard DM.
I see now. So you don't translate 1d8+5 into a fixed value that will be 33% higher - you roll damage then divide by three, round to nearest whole number and add that value to your rolled damage. That makes a lot more sense.
Probably not something I could do lightning fast, though.
Probably not something I could do lightning fast, though.
Jack99
Adventurer
Actually I do. Sorry if I was unclear in my last post. If a monsters does 1d8+5 damage; thats 9,5 average. That means it has to do on average a bit more than 3 more, which in turn it translates to 1d8+8 damage. Makes more sense?
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